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Will this work ?? Drive cloning question.

J

jaypeezee

Gawd
Joined
Jun 11, 2003
Messages
1,000
I am building two workstations for my dad's work. The systems are exactly the same setup - both hardware and software wise. I have never really messed with drive cloning and have pretty much done everything manuall or one by one. So i figured what not a better way to test the waters with these two computers.

What I want to do is Install XP Pro, Office 2003 SB Editition, and all drivers etc...

The hardware setup is as followed

CPU P4/2.66GHz 533M 478
INTEL 915G D915GUXL Mobo
Wintec 512MB DDR2
Hiatchi 80GB SATA Drives
CD-RW
Floppy

Motherboard has onboard sound/video/lan

So back on topic. I want to setup one drive with all the proper programs/drivers etc... then clone it so the other drive is identical and will work in the other unit. I have legitimate copies of XP PRO so each version has it's own CDKEY.

The real problem i face is, the Motherboards havent arrived yet. So i wanted to see if possible to setup and install all programs/drivers etc right now on my computer and then put everything together when it comes and should be good to go. My fear i have is XP doesnt like hardware upgrades... if I set it up not loading MY SYSTEM DRIVERS, but installing the drivers for the motherboard thats coming will XP give me an error or anything that will stop me from loading... ?

I could do this trial and error without even posting but I figured i'd ask you guys to see if you have done this before and encountered any types of problems or easier solutions methods to doing what i am trying to accomplish.

ohhh and which program would be best ? Ghost ?
 
On identical hardware you can. As far as doing it on your computer you might can get away with it, but you're going to have a really hard time pulling it off. The more differences there are between your machine and the other two, the less likely it will work. I could tell you how to do that, but suffice it to say you're better off waiting until the parts come in, and then do all the software work on one machine, then clone the drive so you don't have to do it twice.

You can setup one exactly the way you like it and take the hard drive from the second computer and install it as a slave or master it doesn't matter. You do need to note which, then get a copy of Norton Ghost or some other drive imaging and cloning utility and copy the drive to the blank one. Then install the drive in the other machine.

Now if they are both going to be on a network you should run sysprep on the machine prior to cloning to chance security id's so that you don't end up with problems when the two are networked.

Things will be really screwed up if you don't and your connecting them to a network domain. Even if they are peer to peer you'll want to sysprep prior to the cloning.

But if they are stand alone and on a network don't worry about it.

Also some applications don't like drive cloning and have some copy protection to prevent them from working after cloning. Adobe Premiere Pro is like that for example. But Office and Photoshop are no big deal.
 
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